Explanations
by kate221b
Summary: Five different ways that events might have turned out, as John deals with the aftermath of Sherlock's drug use on the plane. Plus one that we'd all like to see.
1. Chapter 1

This is the first of a series of 'five plus one stories'. All are set in 221b immediately after Sherlock gets off the plane in TAB and John confronts him about his drug use. Some contain angst, some (mild) Johnlock, some are completely straight. And the others? Well you'll just have to wait and see..

* * *

 **Variation no. 1**

'Don't tell me - you're not angry with me, you're disappointed in me?'

'Nope. I'm absolutely fucking furious with you.' John shook his head at Sherlock's expression, moved away and slammed his fist into the wall of the living room in 221b, leaving a slight dent in the plaster under the wall-paper that would have Mrs Hudson wringing her hands in horror. But it was better than his preferred option of making an even bigger dent in the soft tissues of Sherlock's face.

'John-'

'What?' John yelled, not caring that Mrs Hudson was downstairs and could probably hear every word. 'What can you possibly say to make this better, Sherlock? You lied to me. You've been using drugs. A whole bloody cornucopia of the stuff. Enough drugs to make the average junkie roll over with his legs in the air. What the fuck were you thinking?'

'You know what? I don't even want to hear your explanations. But you know what pisses me off the most? You lied to me. Over and over again you lied to me. And I thought -' his voice caught and he sat down with a thump in the armchair - his armchair. 'I just thought that you respected me more than that.'

'I do respect you John.'

The answer when it came was uncharacteristically quiet. It made John look up to see Sherlock standing by the window, a strange expression on his face, swaying slightly.

'Fuck. Sit down before you fall down will you?' He jumped up from the chair and taking Sherlock by the shoulders steered him to the other armchair, pushing him down into it. 'You look like crap.'

'It will pass.' Sherlock wearily rubbed his forehead, then leant forward, elbows propped on his knees, head resting on the tips of his fingers in his characteristic thinking pose.

John reached forward to check his pulse, but Sherlock shook his fingers off and John gave up, sitting back in his chair with a sigh.

'You could have killed yourself. You know that?'

'Unlikely given the doses and the precise mixture of agents. The heroin carries a risk of respiratory depression admittedly, but when offset by the-'

'Stop it, Sherlock,' John interrupted him. 'I don't want to hear you trying to rationalise this. I'm a doctor, remember? And I'm telling you that I've dead bodies who've taken fewer drugs than you did today.'

'I've taken worse.'

'I'm sure that you have. Is that meant to make it better?'

'I had to find the answers, John, don't you understand? I had to work out how he did it. I had to know if he was really dead.'

'And is he?'

'Yes. And no.'

'What the fuck is that meant to mean?'

'Moriarty the man is dead, unquestionably. The idea that lives on is harder to kill. There are any number of Moriartys out there, just as there were any number of Emilia Ricolettis. Innumerable copycats, willing to use a single identity to further their own cause.'

'So the actual Moriarty?'

'Is dead. Of course he's dead. He left half of his occipital cortex splattered over Barts' roof. How could it be otherwise?'

'It could been an illusion - he could have shot a blank, used a blood bag, a load of cows brains -'

'While I was looking at him? Impossible.'

'What if there were more than one of him. What if he had a twin brother? Identical twins - what if..'

Sherlock gave John one of his old looks of distain and sighed. 'It's not twins, John. It's never twins.'

He stood up, slightly unsteadily and headed towards the door.

'Where are you going?'

'Bath.'

'No, you're not,' John jumped up from his chair and cut between Sherlock and the door, blocking off his exit.

Sherlock stared at him blearily and then sighed. John held his gaze, hoping he didn't look as angry as he felt. Then Sherlock made a move to his left, which John moved to block, then changed direction at the last moment and dodged round John to the right. He would have made it if John, with a soldier's reflexes, hadn't turned at the last moment, and a brief scuffle ensued as he tried to grab Sherlock first by the arm, and then when that failed, round the waist before he could get out of the room

'Stop it, Damn you!' he shouted as Sherlock twisted away from him for a second time and John found himself dragged halfway down the corridor, grabbing the back of Sherlock's coat for purchase. But Sherlock was too quick, and John found himself holding onto a coat with no occupant as Sherlock reached his target destination and slammed and locked the door.

'Damn you,' John repeated in a whisper as he heard the sound of taps running, and defeated he slid down the door with his back to it, so he was sitting with his head resting against the door.

'I know what you're doing in there, you know,' he called through the flaking white paint of the Victorian panelled door. 'This is what you did before, isn't it? After Magnussen? When you came back from that squat looking like death warmed up, went all tiger-man at Mycroft on the come down from whatever you'd been injecting yourself with, and then came out of the bathroom twenty minutes later all bright eyed and bushy tailed. You took something, didn't you. What was it? Speed? Metamphetamine? Mephedrone? Or did you stick with the traditional and go for cocaine? You took something to 'get you through' that meeting with Magnussen, and I was too busy being shocked about you and Janine to notice it.'

There was silence in the bathroom, but the taps were turned off and there was a splashing sound as Sherlock, he presumed, climbed into the bath.

'Did Janine know? About the drugs? But then she was meant to, wasn't she. She was meant to tell Magnussen to make you think that you were a junkie, to make you less of a threat. And to make him think that that was your weak point, the trigger he could use to get to you.' His voice tailed off, not wanting to go where this trail of conversation would lead him.

'Damn it, Sherlock,' he whispered, struggling to keep his voice from cracking. 'Why couldn't you just have told me? I could have helped.'

Behind the door, Sherlock Holmes slid down the bath until his head was entirely submersed by the water, blocking out the sound of John's voice behind the door and closed his eyes. It was pleasant in his underwater world, the distant sounds soothing. The hum of the pipes, the tidal noises of the water moving in the bath with each tiny adjustment of his body. It would have been easy to just stay there and let himself drift off.

The drugs were wearing off now and with them the familiar symptoms of a come-down reasserted their presence. Every muscle ached, his head was beginning to throb and he felt vaguely nauseated. He could feel his mind beginning to slow and an all-consuming fatigue threatened to overwhelm him. He was careful to restrict his heroin use to within the boundaries of physical addiction, and besides, his time in prison had given him an obligatory week's long period of abstinence. He wouldn't withdraw, but the come-down from the cocktail of drugs that he had taken would still be unpleasant, as he knew from previous experience.

He had two choices now - sleep, or take more drugs. The drugs, frustratingly, were concealed in the lining of his coat. The coat that, had he known it, John was holding, almost hugging, on his lap, directly outside the door.

Eventually, Sherlock conceded to the burning of his lungs and allowed his head to float up above the water where he took grateful breaths of the humid air.

John was quiet now, but Sherlock could hear his soft breathing through the door. He was angry, Sherlock knew. He wanted an explanation but Sherlock couldn't give him one. He couldn't explain to him the sheer terror that had gripped him when he believed for those few minutes that Moriarty had genuinely returned. If Moriarty was back then all that he had gone through in those two years away had been for nothing. He had sought to annihilate Moriarty's network, his memory and everything that he had stood for, for one simple reason. To keep John safe. If he was back, then all of that had been futile.

And worse still, Magnussen had proved that Moriarty wasn't the only one who made John a target. Anyone who wanted to get to Sherlock had realised that the way to do that was through John. And to keep John safe, he had sworn to keep Mary safe, because even before he had realised _who_ Mary was, he had realised _what_ Mary was; a dangerous woman who cared about John as much as he did and would do absolutely anything to keep him safe. And anything for Mary he now knew to be an almost infinite resource. If he had picked a personal bodyguard for John, he could not have done better.

When he had received the telephone call from Mycroft, the elation of his reprieve had been short-lived, followed by the desperate need for knowledge and understanding that had sent him hurtling into his Mind Palace.

And now what he felt was a deep and overwhelming sense of depression. He was tired, too tired to go into battle again. If Moriarty had been genuinely alive he would willingly have hunted him down and destroyed him for a second time, and as many times as it took to see him truly defeated. But Moriarty now existed only in his mind, and no matter how many enemies he destroyed, he would remain there for as long as Sherlock's conscious mind survived. Moriarty was both his nemesis and his alter ego. His dark twin, a reflection of what he himself could have become without John, without Lestrade, without those who cared for him and kept him on the right path.

The solution that Mycroft had given him had in many ways seemed perfect. John was safe in the arms of Mary and would no longer be his responsibility. The choice was taken out of his hands and there could be no question of regret. Within six months it would be over and done with, and there would be no time within the mission for reflection or regret. Action, intellect, blood and oblivion. It had been more appealing than Mycroft could possibly have realised.

And now even that had been taken away from him and he was back exactly where he had been at the beginning. In 221b, with John, with another mystery to solve and yet he could get up no enthusiasm to do that. Without Moriarty, the case was - dull, boring. A copycat at best, and he suspected that it wouldn't even turn out to be that exciting. What he wanted to do was sleep, preferably with pharmacological assistance, and to try to forget.

The hammering on the door made him jump.

'Sherlock? You okay in there.'

'No,' he wanted to reply. 'I'm not okay, John. I'm not okay at all.'

But instead he remained silent.

'Sherlock, if you don't answer me, I'm going to break that door down, so help me. And we all know how angry Mrs H would be about that."

Reluctantly, Sherlock heaved himself out of the bath, wrapped a towel round his waist and yanked open the door so fast that John, who had been leaning against it, fell in an ungainly heap at his feet.

Sherlock stepped over him silently and headed towards his bedroom, pulling the door closed behind him.

'Oh no you don't!' John had somehow managed to scramble to his feet in time to get a foot into the doorway, preventing Sherlock from slamming it in his face. The face that was now only inches away from Sherlock's own. 'We need to talk about this, damn it.'

'No we don't. I don't need to talk; I need to think.'

'You mean you need to go back to your Mind Palace? The one that you convinced me was a product of your genius mind and instead turns out to be a product of a cocktail of hallucinogens?'

'No, John,' he replied wearily. 'I mean what I said - I need to think. And to sleep.'

'And you don't think that you owe me any sort of explanation - any at all?'

John's face had that expression. The forced grimace that meant he was about to become really, really angry and Sherlock knew that he couldn't bear that. Not again, not feeling like this.

So in a rare moment of insight, he chose instead to defuse the situation and removed his hand from the door, allowing John to swing it fully open, and then walked away from the doorway to sit down on the edge of his bed, head in hands.

'I can't explain, not now.'

'Then when, Sherlock?' The edge of anger was still there, but it had been joined by something else - concern and just possibly, compassion.

'Later. I'm tired, John. This last week has been - challenging. I just need to sleep.'

'With drugs? You really think I'm going to let you -'

'No, John. Not with drugs. It's not always about drugs you know. Just - sleep. Although a cup of tea would be nice if you're offering.'

He stood up and turned away from John to start pulling pyjama trousers and a top out of the chest of drawers, one hand holding the towel around his waist, and John was suddenly acutely aware of his friend's near-nakedness.

'Tea. Just - normal tea?' he asked uncertainly.

'If you'd be so kind.'

'And you promise you won't -'

'Inject or snort myself into a cocaine and opiate induced state of oblivion in the three minutes that it takes you to boil a kettle and concoct the complicated cocktail known as 'a nice cup of tea?' I think that I can resist for that long.'

'Right. Fine. John said, starting down the corridor before turning back towards Sherlock sharply, almost as if expecting to catch him with his hand in the sweetie jar, or in this case the illegal substances jar.'

'I'm not going to leave you alone, you know,' he told him, before continuing down the corridor.

'Don't think that I don't count on it,' came Sherlock's soft reply, so quiet, that John almost wondered if he had imagined it.

* * *

This is my first foray into the 'five plus one' format. Please do let me know what you think - I might be persuaded to expand on some of these if any of them particularly tickle people's fancy. Always open to requests and suggestions.

And reviews are what keep me writing - just in case you were wondering whether to leave one or not.

As always, this story comes with massive, massive thanks to 7percentsolution for amazing betaing and support. I couldn't do it without you!


	2. Chapter 2

**Authors note:**

All of these stories start in exactly the same way - just in case anyone thinks that I've posted the same one twice! The idea is that tiny little changes in what Sherlock and John say or do (and sometimes differences in the drugs that Sherlock has taken) force the situation into an entirely direction.

This one is probably the gentlest of the bunch, but not necessarily an indication of how the rest of the series are going to go...

* * *

 **Variation no.2**

'Don't tell me - you're not angry with me, you're disappointed in me?'

'Nope. I'm absolutely fucking furious with you.' John shook his head at Sherlock's expression, moved away and slammed his fist into the wall of the living room in 221b, leaving a slight dent in the plaster behind the wallpaper that would have Mrs Hudson wringing her hands in horror. But it was better than his preferred option of making an even bigger dent in the soft tissues of Sherlock's face.

'John-'

'What?' John yelled, not caring that Mrs Hudson was downstairs and could probably hear every word. 'What can you possibly say to make this better, Sherlock? You lied to me. You've been using drugs. A whole bloody cornucopia of the things. Enough drugs to make the average junkie roll over with his legs in the air. What the fuck were you thinking?'

'You know what? I don't even want to hear your explanations. But you know what pisses me off the most? You lied to me. Over and over again you lied to me. And I thought -' his voice caught and he sat down with a thump in the armchair - his armchair. 'I just thought that you respected me more than that.

'I do respect you John.'

The answer when it came was uncharacteristically quiet. It made John look up to see Sherlock standing by the window, a strange expression on his face, swaying slightly.

'Fuck. Sit down before you fall down will you?' He jumped up from the chair and taking Sherlock by the shoulders steered him to the other armchair, pushing him down into it. 'You look like crap.'

'It will pass.' Sherlock wearily rubbed his forehead, then leant forward, elbows on his lap, resting his head on the tips of his templed fingers in his characteristic thinking pose.

John reached forward to check his pulse and Sherlock silently submitted to his ministrations, dropping his hand down to allow John easier access.

'You could have killed yourself. You know that?' John asked when he was confident that Sherlock's pulse, while a little fast, was of good volume and showed no indication of his imminent collapse.

'I had to know.' Sherlock's words were slurred slightly now and John moved his attention from his pulse to his eyes. The pupils were tiny, almost pinpoint.

'Fuck, Sherlock, how much of that stuff did you take?'

'Enough to discover what I needed to know.'

'You should be in hospital.'

Sherlock slowly shook his head. 'No hospital. I'll be fine. It will wear off in -' he looked at his watch, blinking to focus. 'Approximately twenty-seven minutes. I just need to stay awake until then.'

'I'll make you some coffee,' John said getting up.

Sherlock chuckled and the chuckle turned into something akin to hysterical laughter. Christ, he was high as a kite, how could John not have noticed it before? Still the laughter was almost infectious.

'What's so funny?' John asked, smiling despite himself.

'That after all the stimulants I've taken today you think that caffeine is going to have the slightest effect on me.'

'Well in the absence of naloxone, it's the best that I've got,' John said, turning to fill the kettle. 'The stimulants are wearing off aren't they? That's the point. So in the absence of any more amphetamines, caffeine will have to do. Unless, of course -'

'I'm not that far gone, John. If you think that I'm going to tell you where I keep them, then you're wrong.'

John slammed the kettle down on its stand and flicked it on before turning to Sherlock, anger overwhelming him.

'Christ, Sherlock, how can you be so casual about this? You're talking about class A drugs. Why for fuck's sake? Why would you do this to yourself? Just tell me this one thing. What could possibly be worth this?'

And Sherlock, whose head was starting to loll to the side slightly and whose eyes were drifting closed, suddenly dragged his eyes open with an effort, stared at John, blinked as if trying to focus and said as if it was the most obvious thing in the world, 'You.'

John had heard of people's hearts stopping at times like this but had never believed it until he experienced it for himself. He swallowed hard. 'What do you mean? he asked, holding Sherlock's gaze.

'I did it for you, John. To keep you safe.'

Then Sherlock's face creased as if in pain, and he buried his head in his hands.

'Shouldn't have said that,' he muttered.

John was across the room in a flash, kneeling next to Sherlock's chair, laying a hand on his arm, feeling the muscles of his forearm tense beneath his grip, resisting the temptation, God help him, to stroke it with his thumb as he held it.

'What do you mean?' he was almost whispering now, but his voice was infused with a gentleness that even Sherlock in his drugged up state, couldn't miss.

Sherlock allowed him to pull his arm away from his face, but kept his eyes fixed on his lap, unable to met John's gaze. John for his part, kept his hand firmly on Sherlock's arm.

'I did it for you, John,' he repeated. 'I did it all for you. The fall off Barts roof, the faked suicide, the disappearance, the two years away destroying Moriarty's network. I did it for you. To keep you safe.'

John stared at him, as Sherlock's face crumpled, and for the first time in all the years he had known him, Sherlock began to cry with genuine tears. John didn't hesitate; he removed his hand from Sherlock's arm and instead cupped it round the back of his friend's neck, pulling his head down onto his shoulder, his other arm round his back, holding him as he cried.

'You stupid, stupid bastard,' he whispered, his mouth close to Sherlock's ear. 'Why didn't you tell me.'

'I couldn't,' Sherlock whispered into his chest, and John felt the warmth of his breath and despite the oddness of the situation, knew that he never wanted to move again. He wanted to stay there, holding Sherlock forever. And he was afraid to speak, because in that moment he felt something he hadn't felt in years - hope.

But at the same time, he didn't want to let the moment to slip away. Sherlock could pass out at any time and this might be his only chance to find out if he had meant what John wanted him beyond all hope or reason to mean.

'Why not?' he murmured, keeping his voice deliberately low and gentle.

'You had Mary. You had found Mary. You were getting married. You had the chance of a normal life. What chance did I have against that?'

'All the chance in the world, you idiot,' John replied, resting his head against Sherlock's and pulling him closer. And if he dropped an almost unconscious kiss onto the top of Sherlock's hair as he held him, so softly that Sherlock wasn't sure if he'd imagined it, then who was to tell?

They stayed like that for several minutes, John's thumb occasionally drifting across the back of Sherlock's neck as they remained, arms locked around each other, until Sherlock finally pulled away and sat up, wiping his eyes on his sleeve like a child. 'Sorry,' he muttered.

'For the drugs or for what you just said?' John asked, standing up to reach for the box of tissues from the bookcase and handing them to Sherlock, who grabbed a handful and blew his nose gratefully.

'Both.'

'Sherlock-' John hesitated for just a moment, contemplating the chair opposite, before dropping down onto the floor in front of Sherlock's chair again and placing a hand on his friend's arm. He didn't speak, just held his gaze silently. Sherlock turned his wrist in John's grasp, and John thought he was going to pull away, but instead he grasped John's hand and held it.

'I couldn't lose you,' he told John.

'And you think it was different for me when you went away? When I thought you were dead?' There was no anger in John's voice, just sadness and regret.

'You didn't feel the same.'

'I …' John brought up his other hand to hold Sherlock's, turning it over as if examining it, looking at the long fingers, marveling at the softness of his skin, wondering at the strangeness of his situation and yet how entirely natural it felt to be sitting here, stroking Sherlock's hand.

'What are you doing, John?' Sherlock asked finally.

'I don't know,' John whispered. 'I just know that I can't bear to lose you. Not again.' He paused for a moment before adding, 'Not ever.'

Then he dared to look up, and the look in Sherlock's eyes told him everything that he needed to know.

Still holding Sherlock's hand tight with one of his own, he raised his other hand to very tentatively lay it against Sherlock's cheek, his heart hammering in his chest at the implications of what he was about to do, as Sherlock turned his face into the warmth of John's hand, eyes closed with the look of a man who had finally found his way to peace.

'Not now, John, he murmured. 'Not like this, not when I'm high. I want to remember this.'

And very gently he moved his face away from John's hand, and stood up, giving John's other hand a reluctant squeeze as he let it go, before standing up and moving towards the door.

Feeling rejected, John stayed where he was, waiting for the bedroom door to slam, but instead Sherlock stopped with his hand on the door frame. 'Stay with me?' he asked softly, and without turning round reached his hand back for John's.

And John without hesitating, took it. Sherlock, without speaking, walked to his bedroom, kicked off his shoes, and sat down on the bed.

'I don't want to be alone,' he said quietly, looking up at John, and there was a vulnerability and a fear in his eyes that John had never seen before.

'Anything that you need,' he told him. 'Haven't you realised that by now?'

And so John spent the rest of that day, not mourning the loss of his friend, as he had expected, but rather curled up on his bed, fully clothed, his body wrapped round Sherlock's, holding him as he slept.

He listened to Sherlock's quiet breaths and counted them from time to time, still aware of the risks of the drugs that he had taken. _'For you, John, I did it all for you_.' Words that he had never thought that he would hear. Where they went from here he had absolutely no idea. Sherlock had a serious drug habit to overcome, he had a wife, and a baby due in eight weeks time, and someone claiming to be Moriarty was threatening national security, but he didn't care. He was here, with Sherlock, and there was nowhere else in the world that he wanted to be.

* * *

Well why delay the gratification? I figured the boys deserved a few hours of happiness after all that they've gone through. I am sort of taking votes on which of these stories people like best, so if you'd like this or any of the other variations continued, then please let me know.

Thank you so, so much to everyone who had read and reviewed. Variation no. 3 coming tomorrow, hurricanes and other major disasters permitting.


	3. Chapter 3

**Variation no. 3**

'Don't tell me - you're not angry with me, you're disappointed in me?'

'Nope. I'm absolutely fucking furious with you.' John shook his head at Sherlock's expression, moved away and slammed his fist into the wall of the living room in 221b, leaving a slight dent in the plaster under the wallpaper, that would have Mrs Hudson wringing her hands in horror. But it was better than his preferred option of making an even bigger dent in the soft tissues of Sherlock's face.

'John-'

'What?' John yelled, not caring that Mrs Hudson was downstairs and could probably hear every word. 'What can you possibly say to make this better, Sherlock? You lied to me. You've been using drugs. A whole bloody cornucopia of the stuff. Enough drugs to make the average junkie roll over with his legs in the air. What the fuck were you thinking?'

'You know what? I don't even want to hear your explanations. But you know what pisses me off the most? You lied to me. Over and over again you lied to me. And I thought -' his voice caught and he sat down with a thump in the armchair - his armchair. 'I just thought that you respected me more than that.'

'It was necessary.'

Sherlock's voice sounded vague as he moved to the window, lifted the curtain and stared out into Baker Street, eyes narrowed as if trying to calculate a tricky equation.

'Necessary? What could require you nearly killing yourself? Just tell me that.'

'I needed answers and I needed them quickly. My Mind Palace was the only way to do that.'

'And your Mind Palace requires drugs to access it? Is that what you're telling me?'

Sherlock turned back to him. 'I've disappointed you, John,' he said, without any trace of emotion in his voice.

'Disappointed me? I'm not your father, Sherlock. I'm not even your brother.'

'No, you're not.'

'So what - I have no right to ask you to hold yourself to a higher moral standard than you appear to want to do?'

'What did you say?'

'I said, that it's probably unreasonable for me to expect you to act like a sensible member of the human race.'

'No, you didn't.' Sherlock frowned slightly, staring at John. 'You said that you expected me to hold myself to a higher moral standard. That's what you said in my mind palace too.'

'So I was in your mind palace? Am I supposed to be flattered by that?'

'Oh it wasn't just you. Mycroft was there too - and Lestrade. Mary, Molly Hooper, even Anderson put in a brief appearance.'

'And what? We were all involved in your lovely little trip to work out a hundred year old, unsolved case.'

'An important case, John.'

John shook his head in disbelief. 'I don't get you. I really don't. Look I'm trying to be understanding here, but don't you have the tiniest bit of insight into the fact that taking drugs in order to solve a case is the most deluded, self-destructive IDIOCY that I have ever – EVER- come across. You stupid, stupid - bastard.' John realised that he was shouting and forced himself to stop and take a deep breath, struggling to get his anger under control.

'Why does it bother you so much?' Sherlock asked.

'What?' John stared at him, trying to work out if he was being sarcastic,

'Why should it bother you that I took drugs to access my Mind Palace? Why did it bother you when you thought that I was taking them before, when you found me in that squat? Why does it matter how I do what I do? Moriarty could have been back. I had to -'

'You had to what? Kill yourself? Because you can't admit that you don't have all the answers?' John was standing up now, fighting very hard the urge to walk over and punch Sherlock in his smug face.

'Five minutes previously, I thought that I was going to go off and allow myself to be killed in Eastern Europe. My chances of survival in the Mind Palace were significantly higher.'

'What on earth are you talking about?''

'It was a one way mission. That was the point. Didn't Mycroft tell you?'

'He implied that it was dangerous, but the words 'one way mission' certainly weren't used. I would have noticed.'

'It was a suicide mission, John.'

'But you would have still have had a chance.'

'And I had a chance with the drugs. The possibility of a fatal overdose was low, and besides which I knew I would be back on the ground within ten minutes. The need for medical attention would have been inconvenient, admittedly, but it was worth the risk.'

'Christ have you listened to yourself?' John interrupted him. 'Sherlock you have a drug problem. Why can't you see that? It's not normal to use drugs to help you work. It's not normal for your brother to find you unconscious in a drug den or an alley or God knows where on multiple occasions. It's not normal - '

'And is that what I should want to be? Normal?'

John recognised the defensive look on Sherlock's face and decided that it was time to change tack. 'Sherlock, come on, this is the addict in you talking. You're out of control and you know it. Look I know a good drug and alcohol counsellor. I could get you an appointment tomorrow - maybe even this afternoon. Won't you at least go and talk to her.'

'No time, John,' came the reply as Sherlock marched over to his laptop and flicked it open. 'We've got work to do.'

'Work to do?' John repeated.

'Work, yes, Moriarty is back, remember? Or rather he is not back but somebody is creating the illusion that he is be back; using his image, his memory to create chaos. And the question is - why?' Sherlock's eyes gleamed with the excitement of a new case, a new challenge.

'And will you be using drugs to help you get these answers?'

'If I have to, yes.' There was the light of challenge in Sherlock's face and John had learnt better than to try to argue with him in this mood.

'Then count me out.'

'What?'

'You heard me, Sherlock. Count me out. Because if you think that I'm willing to just sit here and watch you justify snorting, or whatever you do with those drugs, yourself into illumination then you're wrong. I won't do that.' John stood up and grabbing his coat from the back of the door, shrugged it on.

'You're asking me to make a choice.'

'Give the man a prize. Yes, Sherlock, I'm asking you to choose. Me, or the drugs. You're going to have to decide which one of us you need to work more. Because I won't stand by and watch you destroy yourself with this. I can't. Don't you understand? After all that you've put me through in the last few years, do you honestly think that I'm going to stand by and watch you do this?

'When you're ready to admit that you've got a problem, then give me a call. Until then, you're on your own.'

...

John walked down Baker Street shoulders hunched, muttering to himself, but instead of heading for the tube and home, he headed instead for Regent's Park. He needed some time to cool off before he faced the jostling mass of people on the tube. In the mood that he was in at the moment, he might just thump anyone who looked at him the wrong way. Bloody Sherlock, why couldn't he admit that he had a problem? Why couldn't he see what he was doing to himself?

He turned left inside the gates of the park, skirting round the outside of the boating lake rather than facing the more popular walk towards the rose gardens and the outdoor theatre. By the time that he had reached the far end and crossed over the bridge, he had calmed down a little, and stopped at the kiosk to buy a coffee. As he poured in the white granulated sugar from the sachets and gave it a stir with the wooden stick provided, he found himself wondering if this could have been how Sherlock had been getting the drugs into his system. Cocaine in his coffee? Amphetamines in his tea? Surely not, but then how? How had he been taking them when John had been staying at 221b with him for much of the time since his discharge from hospital without him noticing? ' _You see, but do not observe, John_.' Had it been right in front of his eyes the entire time?

The realisation of his own failure threatened to reverse all of the benefits of his walk and the physical distance that he had been trying to create between himself and an impossible situation. Forcing himself to acknowledge that anger was going to get him nowhere, he turned instead to the techniques learnt in his months of counselling after his return from Afghanistan. Trying to take a step back, and work out why he was so angry.

' _You cant always change a situation, but you can often change how you feel about a situation, and that in turn will change how you react to it,'_ came Ella's voice.

He was angry with Sherlock because he had been using drugs. Because John himself could not understand how somebody so brilliant could feel the need to pour that junk into his body just to prove that he was more clever than anybody else.

And then he understood. It wasn't that Sherloc _k wanted_ to be cleverer than everybody else. It was that he _needed_ to be cleverer than everybody else. Because if he wasn't, then what did he have?

And he believed that the drugs were what made him like that. How long he has been using the drugs for, John had no idea. He remembered Sherlock entering his Mind Palace in Baskerville, and he remembered him using the technique before that - to sort data, to recover memories, to solve cases, Had all of that been drug-fuelled?

He remembered Sherlock's words on Bart's roof, and wondered how many of them had been true. _'It was a trick. Just a magic trick. I discovered everything that I could to impress you.'_

Had the trick been drugs all this time? He didn't believe it, not for a second, but if Sherlock believed it, then...

Then he was asking Sherlock to give up the one thing that he cared about. _'It's all about the work.'_ How many times had John heard him say that? And ' _The mind is what matters. Everything else is transport_.' And if John was asking him to give up drugs, would that in his mind mean giving up the work? And if he was giving up the work, then -'

And then John realised what he had done. And he turned back towards Baker Street, walking as fast as he could and then breaking into a run when even that proved too slow.

 _'You can't blackmail an addict into stopping using,'_ he remembered the peer support worker telling him during his short stint with the Drug and Alcohol Team as a GP Trainee. _'You can't plead with them to stop in order to prove that they care about you. It doesn't work like that. In their head, all that they have, all that they are is based on their habit. And if you take away that, then they believe that they have nothing. If you withdraw your love and support then they will only turn further to the drugs, and if you take it away entirely, then they may lose hope all together.'_

 _'But if you don't say anything, then aren't you just condoning their actions?'_ he had argued, thinking of Harry. Thinking about how he could never bear to just sit there and watch her drink herself into oblivion. About how eventually always crack and tip the contents of every bottle of alcohol that he could find down the sink. But there were always more. Somehow, she always got hold of more.

But the peer supporter had just shaken her head at him. _'You're missing the point,'_ she had said. _'It's all about control. The majority of addicts use to escape themselves because they feel somehow damaged, incomplete.. The only person who can make an addict stop using is themselves. Try to take the control of their use away from them and what do they have left? You risk leaving them with only one possible option. And that is why the time when an addict is facing up to their illness is the most dangerous time in terms of overdose.'_

John knew that, he knew all of it, he had just dragged it out of his long-term memory in a feat that even Sherlock would be proud of. So what sort of useless doctor was he to allow his anger to override his concern for Sherlock?

Sherlock hadn't done this to piss John off. He had done it because he was an addict. He hadn't hidden his habit from John to be devious, he had done it because that was what addicts did. And he wasn't refusing to accept that he had a problem to be difficult, he was doing it because he had a deep and entrenched addiction and was terrified of facing life without a pharmaceutical cushion.

And John should have known all of that, but instead he had treated him like a five year old and abandoned him. And knowing Sherlock, and how he reacted to being backed into a corner, there was only one possible outcome to that.

It took him a less than fifteen minutes to get back to Baker Street, and when his knocking went unanswered, he lost no time in letting himself in at the street door. He ran up the stairs, and entered the flat without knocking, panting with the exertion of the run.

'Sherlock, I'm sorry,' he said. 'I didn't get it. I do now. I know it's not that easy, I know you can't just -' and then he stopped talking as he walked round his chair and saw the syringe lying on the floor, and next to it the prostate, barely breathing figure of Sherlock Holmes.

* * *

 **Authors Note:**

It took me a while to realise that this is sort of like Groundhog Day for John. He's basically going through the same situation time and again, trying to get to he outcome that he wants. And why it might seem as if that's variation no.2, I think that what he really wants is for Sherlock to acknowledge that he's got a problem and agree to get some help.

For what it's worth, this is probably my favourite variation. It's also the first one where John really starts to understand the nature of addiction. But there's still plenty more to come.


	4. Chapter 4

So in case you haven't noticed, my mission with this 'five plus one' was to publish a chapter a day, with the 'plus one' on day six. I didn't want to declare myself on that until I knew I could do it (ever the pessimist), but so far it's all going to plan.

Variation no.3 is the clear winner so far, but I'm still taking votes, so please do keep reviewing and let me know what you think.

Enjoy!

* * *

Don't tell me - you're not angry with me, you're disappointed in me?'

'Nope. I'm absolutely fucking furious with you.' John shook his head at Sherlock's expression, moved away and slammed his fist into the wall of the living room in 221b, leaving a slight dent in the plaster behind the wallpaper that would have Mrs Hudson wringing her hands in horror. But it was better than his preferred option of making an even bigger dent in the soft tissues of Sherlock's face.

'John-'

'What?' John yelled, not caring that Mrs Hudson was downstairs and could probably hear every word. 'What can you possibly say to make this better, Sherlock? You lied to me. You've been using drugs. A whole bloody cornucopia of the things. Enough drugs to make the average junkie roll over with his legs in the air. What the fuck were you thinking?'

'You know what? I don't even want to hear your explanations. But you know what pisses me off the most? You lied to me. Over and over again you lied to me. And I thought -' his voice caught and he sat down with a thump in the armchair - his armchair. ' I just thought that you respected me more than that.'

'It was necessary.'

'Necessary? When has nearly killing yourself ever been necessary?'

Sherlock remained motionless, staring out of the window of 221b, his back rigid, betraying the tension that he felt.

'Oh Christ, that's what it's all about isn't it? This bloody martyr complex of yours. The need to sacrifice yourself for other people? Are you honestly trying to tell me that you've just been pouring that stuff into your body to protect us? To beat Moriarty? Is that what you truly believe, Sherlock?

'Did it ever occur to you that maybe we didn't need protecting? That we were quire capable of protecting ourselves? That what we wanted was for you to be here, with us and not risking your life jumping off a building, or running round Bosnia killing terrorists, or going on whatever insane mission you were off to in Eastern Europe. Did that thought ever cross your mind? That you didn't have to be James bloody Bond to make us care about you?'

There was a long silence.

'Say something, damn you,' John said finally.

'What would you have me say?'

'Something. Anything. Just - explain it to me, will you. Explain to me why you feel the need to do these things.'

'I told you. Because it was necessary.'

'And who decides what is necessary, Sherlock? Hmmmm?' John was struggling to remain in control, not to let the anger show in his voice. 'Why didn't you just tell me what you were doing?'

'Because you would have tried to stop me'

'Damn right, I would.'

'John, you have to understand. I need the drugs. Without the drugs - _I can't work._ '

'And that makes it okay?' John sighed and shook his head. 'I don't understand you Sheelock, I honestly don't.'

'Do we have to do this now?' Something in Sherlock's voice was uncharacteristically weary and John looked up to see him standing by the window, swaying slightly.

'God, you look like crap,' John said, jumping up and steering Sherlock towards his chair. 'How are you even still standing?'

'With practice and strength of will,' Sherlock said, allowing John to guide him to the chair. 'I may have over-estimated the dose a little, that's all.'

'Did you really take everything on that list?'

'Shocked, John?'

'More concerned, actually. That was one hell of a cocktail.'

'I told you, it was necessary,' Sherlock said, squeezing the bridge of his nose.

'And was Mycroft right? Were you high before you got on the plane?'

'I wasn't sure I'd get another opportunity.'

'So how...'

'How did I manage to shoot up when I'd been in prison for a week? A junkie will always find a way,' he said bitterly. 'Haven't you learnt that by now?'

'Is that what you think of yourself?'

'It's what you think of me.'

'Sherlock, no,' John shook his head. 'That's not what I think of you. I'm just - surprised that's all, and okay maybe a little shocked. All those months when I was living here after you got out if hospital. Were you -'

'Using? I really wish you'd learn to finish your sentences, John. Not most of the time, no. But then I wasn't working most of the time was I? My brother and Lestrade conspired to ensure that.'

'Plus you were on some fairly hefty painkillers. Did that -?'

'Not in the doses they're prescribed, no. Are we really going to sit here and have a conversation about my drug habit?'

'If that what it takes, then yes. Good to hear you admitting that you have a habit by the way.'

'I was just voicing what you were thinking,' Sherlock said with a sigh.

'Sherlock, could you just try to be honest with me - even if it's just for an hour or so?'

'Believe me, John. You really don't want to know.'

He looked waxy pale now, dark circles under his eyes. 'You couldn't be more wrong,' John told him firmly. 'Now explain to me how it works.'

'Really?'

'Really. I just want to understand this. Tell me what the drugs do for you. You use them to explore your mind palace, yes?'

'I use the drugs to help me access my Mind Palace. Once there, I can wander around, open doors, discover memories that would otherwise remain buried. I need different drugs to take me to different levels of the palace.'

'But diamorphine - heroin is what gets you in there in the first place.'

'Among other things, yes.'

'So what else? What else do you need to get you in there.'

'I have to be able to dissociate from the real world - but not too much. I tried a variety of substances to acheive that effect. Ketamine proved the most useful.'

'And you can control that? I've heard of people having horrible hallucinations with ketamine, And what about emergence phenomena?'

'Negated if you offset the ketamine with benzodiazepines. It's a fairly effective combination .'

'Benzos and ketamine and diamorphine?' John was trying to avoid letting the shock of what he was hearing show in his face, but was aware that he was almost certainly failing. 'How the hell did you stay awake?' he asked. 'That's virtually a general anaesthetic you've been giving yourself Sherlock - why weren't you just unconscious - or snoring?'

'It was on the list, John.'

'Amphetamines, of course, to offset the sedation. That's quite a mix.'

'But effective.'

'How long did it take you to work that out?'

'Years. Decades. Not all of my experiments were successful.'

'Hence Mycroft having to retrieve you from various squats?'

'No, that was more - recreational use.'

'So how did you keep yourself safe the rest of the time?'

'I didn't. I used short-acting agents where possible. I tried to set safety nets.'

'What sort of safety nets?'

'People who I knew would come and find me. You - John. More often than not.' He glanced up at John, gauging his reaction.

John thought of all the times he had come back to 221b to find Sherlock lying on the sofa, as still as a statue, fingers templed. Of the days that he had spent barely moving, barely speaking, refusing food, drinking only tea, How could he have been so blind? How could he not have realised what was behind it?

'You never asked, John,' Sherlock said, watching his expression.

'Would you have admitted it?'

'Not at the beginning, no, but later - yes. Perhaps in some ways I wanted you to work it out.'

'But I never did.' John paused, considering what Sherlock had told him. 'Was that why you were so keen to share with me?' He asked. 'So that I'd be there? So that somebody would be there?'

'It was a condition from Mycroft. He didn't trust me to live alone, told me I could only move out of his house if I found a flat-mate. Someone responsible, preferably a doctor. I mentioned it to Stanford, who as you know is acquainted with most of Bart's hospital and that very afternoon he walked in with you.'

'But I never found anything,' John said. 'All those danger nights when Mycroft asked to search the flat. And those other times, when Lestrade searched. We never found anything.'

'Because you were looking in the wrong place. They weren't in the flat.'

'So you've got somewhere else you keep them? Somewhere outside?'

'You want to know all my secrets, John?'

'Preferably, yes.'

Sherlock shook his head, and John realised he was going to have to try a change in tack.

'Okay then, tell me just one thing, how did you manage to get high when you'd been in prison for a week? Don't tell me that Bill Wiggins dressed up as a cabin steward or something stupid and slipped you some?'

'Don't be ridiculous. I wouldn't touch anything that Billy Wiggins had procured for me. I prefer to produce my own - or at least to purify it.'

John remained silent, storing this information away for later. Sherlock was manufacturing his own drugs. But not in Bart's lab, Molly would have been onto him like a shot, so where?'

'So the drugs that you used on the plane. They were from your own personal stash.'

'Correct.'

'So how - OH!' John smacked himself in the forehead with the flat of his hand. 'God, I've been so stupid. How could I have missed it? Your coat, they're in the bloody coat. It's always with you, so it would have been given back to you when they released you from prison.'

Sherlock was looking distinctly uncomfortable. 'I'm right, aren't I ?' John asking, trying to resist the urge to smile at his friend's expression.

'Just - don't tell, Mycroft. Promise me, John.'

'Okay, fine. I won't tell Mycroft, it's clever though, I'll give you that.'

Sherlock sighed and rubbed his forehead with a hand. 'Clever? I wouldn't call it that.'

'You okay?'

'They're wearing off. The come-down is never pretty.'

'Can I get you anything?'

'Some benzos would take the edge off things nicely, but I presume that's out of the question?'

'Tell me you're joking.'

Sherlock shrugged. 'Failing that, some paracetamol and several glasses of water would help.'

John walked over to the kitchen to fetch his requests. 'So is that what you normally do? Take something afterwards?'

'If I need to. Yes. Not always benzos. If I'm on a case I take something more - stimulating.'

'Speed?'

'Or cocaine. Either is effective.'

John nodded, reminding himself that he wasn't here to judge. He wanted desperately to grab Sherlock by the scruff of his neck and drag him off to the nearest drug and alcohol place to get him checked out. Find out what sort of damage he'd done to himself with all those chemicals that he'd been pouring into his body for years, but Sherlock wasn't ready for that, not yet. The fact that he was openly about his habit was an important first step, but it was the first step in many.

'So what now?' he asked conversationally.

'Now, I take the paracetamol, I drink the water and I try to sleep it off.'

'And that's it?'

'For now, yes.'

'And the contents of your coat?'

'One step at a time, John,' Sherlock said with a sigh, as he stood up and walked wearily to his bedroom, slamming the door shut behind him.

* * *

 **Authors note:**

I like to think that John's subconscious is somehow learning as this process goes on. This time he's nearly there - he's got Sherlock openly talking about the drugs at least, even if he hasn't got him admitting that he's got a problem. He's got one more stab at getting it right.

If you want to know where Sherlock gets his drugs from, then have a look at Studies in Serotonin, also on here.

And as ever, thank you so much for reading and reviewing. The response to this series has just bowled me over - it's definitely a format I'll be trying again!


	5. Chapter 5

**Variation no.5**

Don't tell me – you're not angry with me, you're disappointed in me?' Sherlock said as he staggered though the door of 221b and threw himself into his chair.

John sighed and wondered what on earth he was meant to say. He wasn't just angry with Sherlock, he was absolutely fucking furious with him, but he wasn't sure that admitting that was going to help anything. In fact it was almost certainly exactly what he wanted – to provoke a reaction, to place John firmly in the parental role, enabling Sherlock to take on the role of moody teenager and kick against it. It was classic borderline behaviour. John knew this, and he wasn't going to play Sherlock's games.

'It's not about me though, is it? It's about you.'

'Oh please, Dr Watson, I'm not one of your patients.'

'Then stop behaving like one.'

John sank into his own chair with a thump, suddenly exhausted from the events of the morning. He had faced the prospect of saying goodbye to Sherlock yet again, possibly forever. He should feel relieved, but instead he could only contemplate the mess that he now found himself in.

Mary had elected to return home on her own, refusing to accompany John and Sherlock in the car.

'He needs you, John,' she had said with a quick glance in Sherlock's direction. 'You, not me. You've got more chance of getting him to face this if I'm not there.'

'Did you know?' John asked, with a quick glance towards Sherlock to make sure that he was still out of earshot in the car. 'About the drugs, I mean? Did you suspect?'

Because if there was one thing that he'd learnt over the last few months, it was that his wife was infinitely more celever than he was. And she noticed things - tiny details that John would never have picked up. She could read people and situations in a way that John, for all his years of medical training, knew that he would never be able to. It was a skill that was partly intuitive, and had come partly through years of using her instincts to survive. Out in the field, if you read a situation wrong, if you failed to identify an exit, if you didn't notice that the man in the corner was carrying a gun, if you misinterpreted an adversary's intent, then you were dead. It was as simple as that. Facing your imminent mortality on an almost daily basis proved a good motivation for fine-tuning your observational skills, she had told him with a grin.

Mary had pulled that face that meant that she knew that she was about to say something that John wouldn't like. 'I suspected, John,' she said. You learn to read the signs. I thought that you knew.'

John shook his head. 'How long have you known?' he asked.

Mary hesitated for a moment before she admitted, 'For a long time, John. Even that night I first met him, I wondered if he had taken something. He was twitchy, hyper-active, he talked too fast, his hands were shaking slightly. But then I'd only just met him, and you were so shocked that he was back I didn't think that it was my place to say anything.'

Her place. Of course. AGRA the agent might had noticed these things, Mary Morstan the practice nurse almost certainly wouldn't. 'I was never sure, John. Not until that day we found him with Isaac in the squat.'

John closed his eyes and looked away. 'I've been an idiot,' he murmured.

'You just didn't want to see, John,' Mary said. But this is your chance to be there for him. Go with him. Support him, but remember that at the end of the day, the only person who can make him stop is Sherlock Holmes. He can't do it for Mycroft, or his parents, not even for you. He has to do it for himself.'

And with Mary's advice echoing in his head, John had slid into the car beside Sherlock, who with a triumphant 'Yes!' was flicking between screens on his mobile phone at a phrenetic speed.

'Cracked it?' John asked, realising that in his shock at the revelation of Sherlock's substantial drug habit, he had almost forgotten that there was still a case to solve.

Sherlock was firing off a text - to Mycroft, John presumed, or possibly Lestrade, with fingers that moved so fast they almost became a blur. There was a beep as the text was sent, and then Sherlock put his phone back in his jacket pocket, and sat back in his seat, with a smug look of self-congratulation on his face.

'What, that's it?' John asked as the car moved off. 'You've solved it just like that.'

'I've found the source of the hack and set the appropriate authorities onto it. Let them do the leg work for once.

'So they've brought you back from exile, and you've solved the case in - ' John looked at his watch, 'fourteen minutes?'

'Nineteen. You forgot the five minutes that I spent in my Mind Palace on the plane.'

'Your Mind Palace. Of course - about that...'

'Besides, it's not solved, not yet. I told you. That was just the first act. Plenty more entertainment to come. Besides I need to spin this out for at least a couple of weeks, I need to justify that pardon that Mycroft is organising. If I make it look too easy they'll think any idiot could have done it.'

'Stop avoiding the subject.'

Sherlock yawned. 'Not now, John,' he said . 'Plenty of time for that later,' and he closed his eyes and with a matter of seconds was asleep.

John had prodded or shaken him from time to time on the forty minute journey back to Baker Street from RAF Northolt, making sure that he was asleep and not unconscious. Sherlock had batted him off each time, which John took as a reassuring sign. He had checked his respiratory rate intermittently as well and found nothing to concern him. Sherlock was breathing at a regular twelve breaths per minute when asleep, faster after John had disturbed him. There were no signs of respiratory depression from the heroin that he had taken, and his pulse when John dropped his fingers onto his wrist to check, was a little fast but nothing more than he would have expected from the immense cocktail of drugs that he had consumed that morning.

He was still deeply asleep when they pulled up in front of 221b Baker Street and John shook him awake. 'Sherlock, come on wake up, we're here.'

Sherlock opened his eyes with a start. 'Where's here?' He asked, sounding dazed.

'Home. 221b. Where did you think you were?'

Sherlock turned his head to look at John, looked round the car and then squinted out of the window - checking, John realised, for signs of reality and the 21st century. 'Were you back in your Mind Palace?' he asked.

'Briefly, yes. I have to tell you, John, you look much better without the moustache.'

'Right. Thanks for that,' John said, as the driver opened the door on his side and he walked to the pavement to wait for Sherlock, who staggered slightly as he got out of the car.

'You okay?' he asked as he grabbed hold of Sherlock's arm to steady him.

'I'm fine,' Sherlock murmured, pulling his arm away from John's and weaving unsteadily to the door of 221b.

It was opened before he even got there. 'Sherlock!' Mrs Hudson exclaimed, reaching out to hug him. 'Mycroft told me you'd be back. Just a silly misunderstanding, he said. Well of course, I knew you'd never shoot anyone. What a ridiculous idea. I've put fresh sheets on your bed, I expect you'll be tired after your time away.'

But Sherlock was already walking past her and making his way slowly up the stairs, supporting himself on the bannister.

'He means thank you,' John said as he made his way up the stairs behind Sherlock.

'Is he okay?' she asked.

'He's just a bit tired and emotional, Mrs H,' John shouted back to her as he took the keys that Sherlock was vainly stabbing at the lock, out of his hands and opened the door. It was of course unlocked, as it always was when Mrs Hudson had been in and was still at home.

And so here they were, back in 221b, back in their chairs, ready for a client to walk in and present them with a case. Apart from they had a case, and it wasn't the one that Sherlock thought that he needed to work on. This one was going to be far more difficult.

'Jesus, look at the state of you,' he murmured, watching Sherlock sitting staring at the dust motes dancing in the sunlight projected through the dusty window as if they were the most fascinating things in the world

'I'm fine,' Sherlock slurred. His pupils when John looks at them were huge, massively dilated. Of course, the heroin that he had taken would have worn off by now, as would the cocaine, leaving a wonderful little mix of ketamine, LSD, codeine and diazepam behind with its residual effects.

'Why so many?' John asked curiously. 'Why did you have to take so many drugs, Sherlock? Why not just stick to one or two?'

'I needed to get deep into my mind palace to find the answers. I took what I need to get there.'

'And look where it got you,' John said dryly.

'It got me answers, John,' Sherlock said, blinking as if trying to focus on him.

'Yes, excellent, it got you answers. Good for you and now -' Sherlock moved his head, looking behind John, staring behind him at something in the kitchen.'

'What is it?' he asked.

'Lizard,' came Sherlock's slurred reply. 'In the kitchen. Purple one. About five feet, I'd say. Looks as if it's after the Earl Grey.'

'Right. This is the ketamine talking, I assume?'

'Mmmmm. It's usually offset by the effects of the heroin and the diazepam. I obviously didn't take enough, now if you just get me my coat -'

'I don't think so,' John said pushing him back into the chair. 'No more drugs, Sherlock.'

'I need the drugs.'

'No, you don't.'

'John?'

'Yup,' John said, staring at Sherlock's coat as it hung on the back of the door, realising that Sherlock had inadvertently told him where he kept his stash.

'Don't leave me,' Sherlock whispered, and when John turned back to him, he was shocked to see that his eyes were full of tears.

'Hey, it's okay, I'm not going to leave you, you idiot,' he said, walking over and sitting on the arm of the chair, pulling Sherlock into an awkward hug, 'This is just the drugs talking. You're going to be fine.'

'I thought I was never going to see you again,' Sherlock said, his voice muffled by John's shoulder.

'It was only for six months,' John said. 'You would have been back.' He pulled away and reached for the box of tissues on the bookshelf, handed them to Sherlock who grabbed a handful and blew his nose noisily.

'It was a one way mission, John,' he said, staring at the tissues in his hand.

'What do you mean?'

'It was a suicide mission- I wasn't expected to survive it.'

'Jesus, Sherlock - why didn't you tell me?'

'I couldn't. I tried - I couldn't.'

John shook his head. 'Well then is it wrong to say that I'm glad that Moriarty decided to make a reappearance?'

'Are you?'

'Of course. You're back aren't you? You're safe and you're well on your way to a royal pardon. What else could you want?'

'What indeed?' Sherlock said, staring at John for so long that John started to feel uncomfortable.

'What is it?' John asked.

'Nothing,' Sherlock said, shaking his head. 'Nothing at all.'

* * *

 **Authors note:**

And that's it. The last of the five. Although there's still the plus one to come and I think that might be the best yet.

I admit this is a bit of a cheat, but I couldn't resist the opportunity to explore the journey from the airfield back to Baker Street. Huge thanks to sevenpercent for pointing out how to fix it so that I could have my cake and eat it. Well sort of..

Thank you so much for reading and reviewing. Please do keep the votes and comments coming in. I'm always open to suggestions and requests!


	6. Chapter 6

**The Plus One**

Sherlock Holmes and John Watson were sitting in companionable silence in the living room of 221b Baker Street; each had a pipe of tobacco in their mouth, and there was a fire burning in the hearth. Holmes felt a rare moment of contentment as he watched the flames. Another case solved, and the prospect of more to come. Watson was back where he should be, in his old seat at 221b, and while both of them were well aware that later he would make his excuses and return home to Hampstead, neither of them chose to mention it.

'Sherlock - time to wake up now.'

The voice seemed to come from nowhere. Holmes looked round, but could see no-one, and Watson seemed blissfully unaware of the intrusion.

'Come on, Sherlock, we need you to wake up.'

There it was again - the disembodied voice. Where was it coming from? He stood up, trying to put down his pipe which seemed oddly wedged in his mouth. Uncomfortably wedged, now he came to think about it and located much was too far back. In fact, it felt as if the stem was being forced down his throat. He coughed, trying to dislodge it, then started to gag, clutching his throat, gasping for breath and frantically signaling at Watson to help him, but Watson remained motionless, staring into the flames as if frozen in time. Holmes staggered towards him, but his legs wouldn't hold him and he fell, not onto the floor but straight through it and his eyes snapped open to...

Lights. Bright lights. Too bright. And voices, talking to him, telling him to breathe out and then with a horrifying rasp, the pipe stem was removed and he could breathe again. Something was placed over his nose and mouth, and he tried to push it away but a hand seized his, stopping him.

'Leave it, Sherlock, it's just an oxygen mask. You're in hospital, you need to lie still.'

John, it was John Watson. The voice was John's, and so was the hand still holding onto his. Curiously he found that he didn't mind the physical contact. He found it rather comforting.

He blinked, trying hard to focus and then tried to sit up, but he felt oddly weak, the hand not restrained by John was tethered somehow, preventing him from moving. Where was he? Was he still on the plane? Had he miscalculated the dose somehow and passed out? He had been in his Mind Palace, projecting himself deliberately back into Victorian times to solve the case of Emilia Ricoletti and solve it he had.

'John -' he tried to say, but his voice came out as a croak.

'Don't try to talk,' John said to him. 'You've been intubated. Your throat is going to be pretty sore for a day or two. Just lie still.'

He blinked again, trying desperately to focus on John. 'What -' he managed.

'You're in hospital, Sherlock. In Intensive Care. You overdosed, nearly stopped breathing. Bloody good job I had my visit bag in the boot of the car and could give you some naloxone. It didn't wake you up, but at least it kept you breathing until the ambulance got there.'

Overdosed? He hadn't done that in a very long time. Not since before he'd met John in fact. He was always so carefully with doses and timings, but there had been an urgency this time that had made him careless. That together with the reduction in his tolerance caused by the enforced abstinence for his week-long brief stay in custody must have been enough to tip him over the edge.

He looked at John who seemed to have just realised that he was still holding Sherlock's hand and let it go.

'What time is it?' he asked, his voice still croaky.

John looked at his watch, 'Three twenty-five in the afternoon' he said.

Three twenty-five. Good. He hadn't lost too much time then. The plane had taken off at 10.15am, he had only lost a few hours.

'You didn't ask what day it was,' John said, watching his expression. 'It's Friday. You've been unconscious for over a day.'

'Moriarty!' Sherlock croaks, trying to sit up again, only to be pushed back by John.

'Mycroft is dealing with it. It's a computer virus anyway, that's all. A complex hack. He's tracking it down, but it looks as if it could just be a scam. No signs of anything sinister at all that he can find.'

'Emilia Ricoletti -'

'Why do you keep going on about her? It's not the same case, Sherlock. You proved that Moriarty really was dead, good for you. Yes, it's possible that somebody is taking on his persona, and trying to reactivate his network - the bits that you left behind anyway. Or this could just be a copycat trying to cash in on his fame. Either way, it got you a pardon and you're off the case.'

Sherlock pulled the oxygen mask away from his face before John could stop him. 'How can I be off the case?'

John grimaced. 'Mycroft is pretty pissed off with you. He says you're not going anywhere near another case - not even this one, until you've proved that you're clean.'

'Clean?'

'They drug-tested you, Sherlock. You lit up every single one of the urine dipstick tests like a Christmas tree. That was the six drug version. Then they tried the ten stick version, and you lit up pretty much every single one of those too. Tell me is there anything that you didn't take?

'PCP' Sherlock said sleepily. 'Never touch the stuff.' The bed was comfortable, it had some kind of air mattress on it, which cushioned his aching body perfectly. He was withdrawing, not badly, he hadn't been on high enough doses of anything for the last few weeks for full withdrawal, but the come down from that quantity of medication could last for days and would be unpleasant enough.

If he wasn't allowed to work on a case then he might as well make the most of the opportunity to sleep. He hadn't been able to do much other than pace, smoke and contemplate his imminent demise for the last week. Confinement, as Mycroft had so accurately deduced, hadn't come easily to him. He closed his eyes.

'Hey! ' John said, shaking his shoulder. 'Wake up. I need to talk to you.'

Sherlock opened his eyes for long enough to glare at him. 'Later, John,' he said.

'No, now. How long has this been going on and why the hell didn't you tell me?'

'Tell you what?'

'Oh, I don't know - that you had a serious drug habit? That you were shooting up every time my back was turned?'

'That's what bothers you most isn't it? That I somehow deceived you.'

'Don't change the subject, Sherlock .'Sherlock.'

'What would you have had me say?'

'Oh I don't know - how about, 'John I'm using drugs and I need help to stop?'

'I don't need help.'

'Because you think that you can just stop?'

'No, because I have no intention of stopping.'

Sherlock yawned and closed his eyes.

'They think you were trying to kill yourself, you know that?' John said conversationally. 'Even Mycroft isn't convinced that that wasn't what you were trying to do.'

'It was a one-way mission, John,' Sherlock said drowsily. 'I didn't have to kill myself. Other people would have taken great pleasure in doing that for me.'

...

When he woke again, he was back in 221b Baker Street, but the Victorian version it. He was sitting in his chair, dozing in front of the fire and John was sitting opposite him. The modern John, and not the Victorian version of him. When he looked down, Sherlock found that he was wearing his normal clothes too - his suit, set for work. Dreaming or in his Mind Palace? He couldn't tell.

'Where are we?' John asked.

'Baker Street, as it was in Victorian times.'

'And why are we here?'

'I don't know. Maybe I need to work something out.'

'Any idea what?'

'None whatsoever.'

'You're going to have to tell me at some point, you know,' John said conversationally.

'Tell you what?'

John chuckled, stood up, walked over to Sherlock, and leaning over the arm of the chair, kissed him, without drama and without pre-amble.

With a start, Sherlock woke up.

It was almost dark now, the room lit only by a single light on the corner and he was in a different room, a private room, the monitors and buzz of the intensive care unit replaced by white walls and a flat-screen television.

A figure was sitting beside his bed, and without even turning his head he knew it was not John, but Mycroft.

'You're going to have to tell him, you know,' he said as Sherlock turned to look at him.

'Tell him what?'

'Don't be ridiculous, Sherlock. You know what.'

'What happened to love being an emotion found on the losing side?'

'Without John Watson, you would have been dead, years ago. We both know that. Don't throw that away.'

'I'm not throwing anything away.'

'Aren't you? Don't try to be a martyr, Sherlock. It doesn't suit you.'

'You're being ridiculous.'

'We both know that I'm not, though, don't we? You threw yourself off a roof to protect John Watson; you spent two years chasing round the world pretending to be James Bond, destroying Moriarty's network for him. And then, when you return and find that he has replaced you, you throw yourself into preserving his new relationship above all else. You make a public vow to do so, in fact. And in the name of that vow, you fail to unveil Mary Watson as the killer that she is, you protect her identity, you risk your life to ensure that John discovers it in a way that has the greatest chance of preserving their relationship, and then you shoot Magnussen because he humiliates John.'

'I shot Magnussen because he needed to die.'

'You shot Magnussen because you see yourself as a dragon slayer and John Watson was your damsel in distress.'

'Don't be ridiculous.'

'Perhaps it's time that you started being honest with yourself, Sherlock.'

'Go away, Mycroft.'

'Why? Because I'm getting too close to home?'

Mycroft lent forward. 'Sherlock, you're into this deep - you and I both know it, and we know where it led before. You need a reason to stop using and the single reason that could possibly be powerful enough to make you do that is John Watson.'

'What makes you think that I want to stop using?'

'What makes you think that I'm going to give you a choice?.'

Sherlock glared at Mycroft.

'Don't be an idiot, Sherlock. You know that I always win.'

'Go away, Mycroft.'

'You could just tell him, you know.'

Sherlock let out a sarcastic snort. 'What declare my undying love for him? '

'If you feel so inclined, but that's not what I'm talking about, as you are well aware.'

'Leave it, Mycroft.''

'Just tell him, Sherlock. If you don't, then I will.'

...

When he opened his eyes again, he was back in the squat. Lying on the mattress in the corner of the room, staring at the sheet hanging over the doorway. He wasn't alone. He could hear soft breathing beside him and rolled over to look into eyes even bluer than his. Christoph's pupils were still tiny from last night's hit, making his eyes even more startling than normal.

'You need to tell him, you know.' he said.

Sherlock sighed and sat up, wrapping his arms round his skinny jeans-clad legs in an almost- forgotten gesture. Sixteen years old, and already on the scrap heap. A teenage junkie, living rough, doing whatever he had to in order to pay for his habit. It was only transport after all.

'Don't you start,' he told him. He hasn't dreamt of Christoph for years, not since his last stint in rehab. It was as if moving into 221b with John had banished Christoph from his mind entirely. But part of him had returned to Sherlock's subconscious in Serbia, when he was being tortured. The voice that he had heard in his head then, telling him to hold on, had always been Christoph's, never John's.

'You need to let me go, Sherlock.'

'I have.'

Christoph chuckled, a forgotten sound, that still made Sherlock's heart skip uncomfortably.

'Is that what you think? I was your first proper case with the police with the police, wasn't, wasn't I? You blamed yourself for my death and you set out to avenge it. If it hadn't been for Greg Lestrade, you would have ended up dead, too.'

'I should never have let you go with that punter. Not on your own. I knew he was dangerous.'

'We needed the money. You couldn't have known what he'd take me into.'

'I should have realised. I should have worked it out. I should have been able to save you.'

'Sherlock, we were high as kites most of the time. We put ourselves in danger every day. You couldn't have known.'

'I should have known,' Sherlock protested stubbornly,

Christoph sighed and reached out a hand to push a curl away from Sherlock's eyes. 'I never meant for you to shut yourself off, you know. This wasn't what I wanted for you.'

Sherlock closed his eyes and reached out for his hand, but as always in dreams, his hand slid straight through him, like the ghost that he was.

'Stop sacrificing yourself for those you love, Sherlock. They deserve better than that.'

'Better than being protected?'

Christophshook his head, 'It's not just about protecting them though is it? If you love him, then you have to trust him with your past. All of your past. I wouldn't have died if it hadn't been for the drugs. You have to stop running away.'

'But he has Mary now. He has the child.'

'Does he, though?'' Came Christoph's fading reply faded, as he slowly disappeared into mist.

...

'You were talking in your sleep,' John said as Sherlock opened his eyes.

'Was I? What was I saying?'

John shook his head. ' A lot of rubbish mainly,' he said and Sherlock didn't know whether to feel relieved or disappointed.

Then John asked curiously, 'Who's Christoph?'

And Sherlock just stared at him for a long moment.

'No really, who is Christoph? You kept shouting his name and you sounded upset.'

'Tell him,' echoed Mycroft's voice in his head.

'Tell him,' whispered Christoph's voice, and it was gentle and loving in a way that it had rarely been in life.

'Tell me who he was, Sherlock,' John said. 'You were almost screaming.'

And Sherlock looked at John, hazel eyes instead of blue, but in them was the same care that had been in Christoph's. And more - in his eyes Sherlock saw compassion and understanding, and maybe, just possibly, something even deeper than that.

His closed his eyes against their power, and shook his head slightly, trying to resist the temptation to just let his guard down, to just let it all out. It would be a relief, wouldn't it? To finally tell someone after all these years?

There was a hand on his arm - warm and reassuring. 'You can trust me, you know,' John said. 'Whatever it is, whatever happened, I'm still here for you.'

Sherlock swallowed hard, 'Christoph was my first case with Lestrade,' he began, but his voice cracked mid-sentence and he found himself unable to continue.

'Ask him, John,' he said, finally, when he had regained control sufficiently to trust himself to speak. 'Ask Lestrade to tell you about it. Tell him that he needs to tell you everything.'

* * *

And that's it. Well sort of. There's a part 2 to this one (yes I know its sort of cheating), which I may or may not post in the week.

Oh and there may or may not be a part 2 to one of more of the variations. I'm still counting up the votes and contemplating...

Thanks as ever to sevenpercent, and also to GhyllWyne and Thessaly Mc for the support and advice.

And thank you all for reading and commenting - you're all fantastic x


	7. Chapter 7

Not another Explanation, I'm afraid - that would be cheating.

This note is to let everyone following this series know that there are now expansions to two of the Explanations that proved the most popular.

Explanations:The Third Variation looks at what happens to Sherlock after he overdoses in 221b

The Ghosts That Make Us is a version of Explanations: The Plus One - exploring John's own piece of detective work into Sherlock's past.

Hope that you enjoy them!


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